Selecting trainee conference interpreters: A preliminary study

This study developed and assessed a set of psychometric tests to aid selection of candidate simultaneous and consecutive interpreter trainees. Three kinds of test were used based either on text materials, linguistic subskills or speed stress Twelve tests in all were administered to 29 trainees beginning an intensive course. The test scores were correlated with judges' ratings in the final interpreting examination. Students who passed the examination had higher mean scores on all tests than those who failed (significant for seven tests). Test scores were positively inter-correlated. Of the two factors characterizing the pattern of correlations, the first loaded highly on completion/detection tests and simultaneous examination ratings; the second loaded highly on recall tests and consecutive examination ratings. Text-based tests were more predictive than subskills or speed stress tests. It is concluded that tests would aid candidate selection, and estimates of improved selection are given. The relationship between test type and interpreting is discussed together with possible reasons underlying differential performance on tests of the same kind.     

Psychodynamic assessment of changes in children with autism under psychoanalytic treatment

In this article the authors report insights into autism developed through their extensive experience of psychoanalytic therapy with children with autism. The fi rst stages of body psychic development are seriously disrupted by this pathology, resulting in primitive anxieties of falling and of being liquefi ed. These anxieties are connected to the fragile development of body ego and of its related spatiotemporal organisation. The changes in children observed by the authors during the therapeutic process lead them to offer a psychodynamic assessment tool, which revolves principally around the development of body ego. After the initial state of 'severe autism', the authors describe three stages: the stage of 'recovery of the skin' (Bick); the established 'symbiotic phase', subdivided into 'vertical then horizontal splitting of the body ego'; and fi nally the stage of 'individuation'. First, the authors describe the principal psychoanalytic approaches to autism and refl ect on the links possible with nonpsychoanalytic work.     

Social Perceptions as Mediators of the Effect of Speech Rate

Research on the relationship between speech rate and persuasion has provided inconsistent results. Recently, it was proposed that speech rate similarity affects compliance by increasing social attractiveness, which is more important to compliance than speaker credibility. Further, it was speculated that social attractiveness produces obligations to aid the speaker. This experiment tested these claims by predicting that if obligations mediated compliance, social attractiveness would only improve compliance when the speaker benefited from that compliance. In a 5 (Speaker Speech Rate) × 2 (Benefit to Speaker) design, 257 listeners, pretested on their speech rate, were exposed to 1 of 10 requests soliciting volunteers for a bogus research project. As expected, speech rate similarity enhanced social attractiveness, and faster speech rates increased speaker competence and dominance. Social attractiveness had a main effect on compliance, suggesting a direct effect on attraction. Higher sociability/character assessments and lower dominance increased compliance when the speaker benefited more, providing only limited support for the mediating role of obligations. Increased dominance and status also augmented compliance, especially when the speaker benefited less from compliance. Thus speech rate and other nonverbal behaviors may effect compliance by increasing the speaker's social attractiveness, creating obligations to comply, or exerting persuasive force through higher status and power.